Fourteen
by Agang11
Summary: After the destruction of Warehouse 13 and it's best two agents, a new Warehouse has been built and it's two newest agent selected. Michael Truman and his best friend, Tracey Dean, have been selected to be the Warehouse's newest recruits, even though they have no experience whatsoever. Their mission: Snag it, bag it, and tag it. Whatever it may be.
1. Chapter 1

_**~Truman~**_

_Arizona. Deep in the desert. A building. Not just any building. Shelves. Shelves and crates. A blue man with glasses. A name: Donovan. A bed and breakfast. And... A football?_

…

"**Truman!**"

Michael jerked awake. His pencil was stuck to his face and his entire English class was laughing. Dr. Sweeney was staring daggers in his direction. "Sorry." Mike replied sheepishly. "Just... Resting my eyes."

"Well, rest them later. Now..." Dr. Sweeney droned on. Something about symbolism or some other pile of literary crap. Mike wasn't listening. He thought about the dream he just had.

This happened a lot to Mike. He would have a weird dream about random things. Once he dreamed about getting beaten up by a giant lobster. The strange thing was that what he saw in his dreams he saw in real life. It had been years since Mike ate at that seafood place, which sucked because they had great shrimp.

Arizona, a blue man with glasses, and a name among other things. What did all those things mean? Mike lived in California in a dorm at UCLA. Arizona was quite a ways away. Mike didn't know anyone who even resembled the man with the glasses. Much less anyone blue. Then there was the name. Donovan? Mike didn't know anyone by that name.

Class ended 10 minutes later. Tracey was waiting at the door. "Hey, Mike." She paused. "What did you do?"

Mike laughed. Tracey seemed to always know when he did something wrong. "I kinda fell asleep in class. I had another one of those dreams."

"What did you see this time?"

Mike thought for a moment. "Nothing important." He didn't feel like boring her with the details. They were meaningless anyway. "So, you wanna grab lunch?"

Tracey smiled. "Definitely. How about Jimmy's?"

Jimmy's was Mike and Tracey's usual hangout spot. It was a two-minute walk from the campus and had the best grilled cheeses in Los Angeles. Today there were only two people in there besides them. Some dude with a crewcut and a black shirt on and a guy with a tank top on and a tattoo of a flaming pit-bull on his shoulder. The crewcut guy had something purple hanging out of his back pocket.

A few minutes later, Mike was face deep in grilled cheese. "Mmm. Oh, God, this is great!" Tracey was eating a small salad and was clearly jealous. "Hey, it's not my fault you're on a diet." Tracey was currently trying to get rid of the dreaded Freshman 15, and was failing epically at it.

"Shut up! You're happy I'm not eating anything good!" She wasn't wrong. A couple of weeks ago Tracey would've been going after the fries Mike got with the sandwich even though she would say she didn't want fries. It annoyed him to no end!

The waiter came back to refill Mike's water. At that point the man with the pit-bull tattoo got up. He pulled something out of his pocket. A flash of light glinted off of the sharp metal point as he raised it behind the waiter. "Look out! He's got a-"

It was too late. The man came down with the knife and jabbed the waiter right in the back of his neck. He screamed in pain and went down. He was dead. The man pulled out the knife and looked at Mike. Mike stood up and ran for it, but the man was quick and blocked the door before Mike could escape. He slowly inched toward Mike, knife in hand. Mike backed up, grabbed the only thing he could reach, and swung it at the man's head. The glass flower vase shattered on impact, some broken glass scratched the man's face. He yelled out in pain, but quickly recovered. He raised the knife and...

_ZAP! _A blast of electricity came out of nowhere, hitting the man and sending him to the ground unconscious. The man with the crewcut stood up, a strange looking gun now in his hand. "Sorry about taking so long." He said. "I couldn't get it out of my pocket." Mike saw that the man had dropped his knife. He bent down to pick it up. "Don't touch it!" Mike pulled his hand away immediately. The man with the crewcut pulled out the purple things in his back pocket: a pair of gloves. He put them on and gingerly picked up the knife, dropping it into a shiny bag. A short burst of light came out of the bag before he zipped it shut. "William Fairbairn's knife. Sorry about that."

Tracey stood up. "What the hell was that?!" She exclaimed. "That guy nearly killed my friend! And who are you?"

The crewcut man said nothing and pointed his strange gun at her. He pulled the trigger and a blast of lightning hit Tracey square in the chest. "Dude! What are you doing?!"

"Sorry about this." Crewcut guy said. "Good thing you won't remember it, though." He fired at Mike. Mike hit the floor, and woke up a few minutes later, the memory of his encounter with Agent Steve Jinks erased from his mind.

…

Mike was glad to be back in his dorm room. The exam in Bio had been tough enough without it being an essay test. Mike was drained completely. As he relaxed on his bed, his phone rang. He answered. "Hello?"

"Open the door." The person on the other end hung up after saying that. _Open the door? _Mike pondered those words for a moment, then shrugged and opened the door. No one was there.

"What the heck?" He muttered as he shut the door and turned back to his bed. He jumped in surprise as now, sitting on his bed, was a girl.

She had short brown hair with a small purple streak in it. She was dressed in tattered jeans and a purple t-shirt with a brown leather jacket. "S'up?" She said casually.

Mike stood there in shock for a moment. "Who are you?" He asked. "What are you doing here?"

The girl stood up. "Michael Truman," the girl said, "my name is Claudia Donovan." _Donovan._ "And what I'm doing here is to give you this." She handed him a folder. Mike took it and stared at it.

"What is this?" He asked.

Claudia smiled. "A ticket to endless wonder." She paused. "Man, I have been so looking forward to saying that!"

"But how- Why- What-" Mike stammered.

"You will report to the coordinates in the file I have handed you in one week. You will be given all other information once you arrive. And don't worry about your classes. I've arranged for you to take an online course while you work."

"Work? But-"

"Sorry, but that's all I can tell you right now." She walked towards the door. "One week." And with that Claudia Donovan was gone, leaving a confused Mike in her wake. He opened the file. Inside was a map with latitude and longitude coordinates in one spot on it. In the corner of it was where the coordinates were. Arizona.

Mike was beginning to think his dream wasn't so meaningless after all.


	2. Chapter 2

_**~14~**_

"I knew I should have fixed the AC before I left." Mike was driving through Arizona and the inside of his car was burning up. It was 94 degrees outside, but felt like a million with the air conditioning busted inside his car.

It had been a week since the woman known as Claudia Donovan had visited Mike and given him directions to this spot. Well, not this spot exactly, but one not too far away. Mike's GPS system told him it was only a mile away. Only one problem: it was one mile away from the main road. "What the?" Mike shrugged and turned off the road, barreling through the desert.

_This is so stupid! _Mike thought. _Why am I doing this? I don't even know where I'm going!_

Then he saw it. A large, rectangular building made of rusted metal with a triangular roof. A crow rested on the edge of the roof, cawing and taking off as he pulled up to the building. He got out of his car and walked up to the building. "Hello?" He called. "I'm here." No answer. "Anyone?"

At that moment a mysterious object flew out of nowhere and hit the building. Mike turned in surprise. "What the?" He went to pick up the object. "A football? Seriously?"

A second car rolled up to the building. Mike recognized it the moment he saw it. "Tracey? What are you doing here?"

Tracey got out of the car and walked up to him. "I dunno. Last week some chick named-"

"Claudia Donovan?"

Tracey blinked. "Yeah. How did you know?"

"The same thing happened to me. Why didn't you tell me about it?"

"Probably the same reason you didn't tell me." That was true enough. Mike didn't tell Tracey because... Well because it just seemed too crazy to be true.

"Hey." Mike and Tracey turned to see a strange man wearing a straw hat, a gas mask, and carrying a metal-detector-looking thing. He removed the gas mask. "Sorry about taking so long. Just had to fix the fish."

"Hey, I know you!" Tracey exclaimed. "You're the guy we saw in Jimmy's!"

The man extended his hand. "Agent Steve Jinks. Pleasure to meet you. Now, follow me." He pulled a remote out of his pocket and pressed the button on it. The door to the building swung open. Tracey and Mike followed Steve Jinks inside. "So, this place is essentially a storage facility for strange and dangerous artifacts." Agent Jinks explained as they walked down a white corridor. "Our job is to hunt down those artifacts and bring them here. Snag it, bag it, tag it."

"This is unreal." Mike stopped and had to lean on a thin, white rod to keep himself from falling over.

"Don't touch the bombs." Mike immediately backed up. Agent Jinks went on. "My friend Artie, you'll meet him later, likes to think of this place as 'America's Attic'. Well, technically not this place. A different place, but also kind of the same place."

"What happened to that place?" Tracey asked.

"It blew up." Another door stood before them. Agent Jinks opened it and the three of them stepped into a cluttered office space. "Please, make yourselves at home. You want a cookie?" Agent Jinks grabbed a plate of cookies off of the desk in the center of the room. Mike took one.

"I'm good." Said Tracey. "I don't really want a cookie."

"You're lying." Agent Jinks replied.

"S'up?" Mike and Tracey turned around in surprise to see Claudia Donovan standing behind them.

"How did you do that?" Mike exclaimed.

"Trade secret." Claudia explained. "So, you two ready for the tour?"

"Uhhh..."

"Good. Just let me get Artie." Claudia walked over to a small, fat cylinder on the floor and flipped a switch on it. Suddenly, a blue hologram of a man with curly hair and glasses appeared over it.

It was the same man from Mike's dream. "Hello." Said the blue man. "You must be our new recruits. Welcome to Warehouse 14."

Mike stared slack-jawed at the hologram. "I'm sorry. Who, or what, are you exactly?"

"Mike and Tracey, meet Artie Nielson: old guy supreme, and dead agent of the Warehouse." Claudia explained.

"Dead? Then why is he a hologram?" Tracey asked.

"Well, Artie was the Warehouse's prime source of artifact know-how." Claudia explained. "So, when he died in the previous Warehouse's explosion, I downloaded his consciousness into this holographic interface I designed."

"How do you download a person?" Mike asked.

"It helps when you have Steve Jobs's thumb drive. It can download files as well as brains." Mike and Tracey stood there shocked as ever. A thumb drive that could download a person's brain? That's impossible! And what was this Warehouse place anyway? "So," Claudia continued, "time for the tour."

…

"I told you not to touch it."

"I know. I know." Mike, Tracey, and Claudia were just arriving at a small bed and breakfast near the warehouse. Mike had smoke coming out of his ears from accidentally kicking over Catherine O'Leary's milk bucket. Tracey was in a fit of laughter. The group stopped outside of the B&B. Mike read the sign. "'The Pete and Myka Bed and Breakfast'. Who are Pete and Myka?"

Claudia looked at the ground. "They were ex-agents of the Warehouse. They died when the old one exploded."

"You feel guilty about that, don't you?" Mike and Claudia looked at Tracey.

"No. I don't feel guilty."

"Yes you do."

Claudia's face went from about to cry to smiling in a split second. Mike barely registered it. "You've got some skill there." Claudia said. They went inside the B&B. "So, you guys can pick any room you want. The owner, Karen, should be back any time now. She just went to town to get some groceries. Anyways, just relax and we'll let you know when-" A buzzing sound came from Claudia's pocket. She pulled a small black box out of it and opened it. "Yeah?"

Inside the black box was a circular television screen. On it was Artie. "Claudia, we need you three back at the Warehouse ASAP."

"We'll be right there." Claudia shut the box and led Mike and Tracey outside again.

"Why do we need to get back to the Warehouse?" Mike asked.

Claudia turned and smiled. "We've got a ping."


	3. Chapter 3

_**~No Other~**_

Mike parked the car in front of the address Holo-Artie had given him and Tracey. They stepped out and walked up to the door which was being guarded by a police officer. "Hold it." He said. "Only law enforcement officers are allowed in."

Mike pulled out the badge Claudia had given him. "Agent Michael Truman. Homeland Security."

The officer's eyes glazed over for a second. "Go on ahead, sir." He said. Mike put away the badge and he and Tracey walked inside.

"I can't believe that worked." Tracey said quietly. Mike couldn't believe it either. The badge was made of wood! Granted, it was wood from the Trojan Horse, but still.

The body was still on the floor, undisturbed by the officers surrounding it. Mike walked up to one. "Fill us in." He said, trying to sound official.

The officer, her badge said her name was Elise, replied "The victim died of suffocation. There are marks on his throat indicating that a rope was tied around it to strangle him. His neighbors say that the victim came outside to get a package on his porch, and never came back out. No one came in or out of his house during the time he was killed. One person said the screen door opened, but no one was around and it was an hour after the murder took place based on what evidence we've gathered. It was probably the wind, though. We are in Chicago, after all." Mike and Tracey shared a look. They had only been on this job for a few hours, but they already knew that it wasn't the wind that made that door open.

Mike thought back to what the other Warehouse agents had told him and Tracey before they went out on this mission.

…

"What the heck are these things?" It was just three hours ago when Mike had been handed a strange gun and a small black box.

"The tools of every Warehouse agent." Holo-Artie explained. "The gun is called a Tesla. It was invented by Nikola Tesla, hence the name, and is essentially a super stun gun. The box is a Farnsworth. We use them to communicate with each other. The signal is untraceable, unhackable, and can broadcast from anywhere." Mike opened the box to see that there was a tiny, round TV screen in it along with a few buttons of varying sizes.

"Now, your mission. Steve, can you pull it up?" Steve clicked something on the computer and a file pulled up on the screen. "The victim: Albert Hicks. Just a few hours ago, he was found dead in his house in the suburbs of Chicago, strangled to death."

"So? It was just a regular murder." Tracey said. "What's so mysterious about that?"

"It's mysterious because Mr. Hicks's neighbors say that nobody entered or exited his house before or after he was found dead. Now, it's up to you to figure out why and how he was killed. Off to Chicago you go, now."

…

Mike was inspecting the inside of Mr. Hicks's house. He found nothing unusual in the kitchen, living room, or bathroom (Although he did have an abnormal amount of rash cream in his medicine cabinet). Nothing here could have been the Artifact.

"Hey, Mike," Tracey called from the bedroom, "I think I found something."

Mike began heading in her direction. "What did you find?"

"I don't know. It's... Something."

Mike walked into the bedroom. "Whoa!" He exclaimed. "That is definitely something!"

One of the drawers on Mr. Hicks's dresser had been pried open. There was a smashed lock on the floor in front of it. "Someone wanted something in this drawer." Tracey said. "But what could it have been?"

Mike looked up and noticed a small camera on the ceiling aimed at the dresser. "I don't know." He said. "But, I know how we can find out."

A few minutes later, Mike and Tracey were on Mr. Hicks's computer watching the security footage from his bedroom camera. After fifteen minutes of watching, they were bored and hadn't seen anything interesting. They were about to call it off when Mike saw something. "Look! There's a guy there!"

A man had just entered the bedroom in a very unusual attire. He wore a set of sunglasses on his face, a black hat with white beads in it on his head that looked very feminine, and had a red, fancy looking robe, like the kind worn by emperors, in his hands on which were a pair of purple gloves just like the kind the Warehouse had supplied for them. He walked up to the drawer with the lock on it, pulled a small hammer out of his pocket, and tapped the lock with it, crumbling it instantly. He opened the drawer and reached in pulling out a golden bracelet and plopping it into a silver bag with a flash of light.

"What the? Is that another Warehouse agent?" Tracey asked.

"I don't think so. Look at the time on the recording. This happened at 11:10, barely five minutes after Hicks was killed. I'll bet anything that guy's our murderer."

"But no one saw anyone go in or out of the house. How could he be in there?"

Mike thought for a moment. "I'm not sure. Maybe we should call the others. They'll probably have some answers as to what's going on, because this video isn't giving us anything."

…

Agent Bronson placed the package on his target's doorstep and rang the doorbell. It was so easy it almost wasn't fun. Almost.

Mrs. James opened the door and looked around. No one was around. At least no one she could see. Bronson smiled. Mrs. James noticed the package, picked it up, and walked back inside. Bronson quickly followed her in, making sure not to touch the door to signal his presence.

"well, what have we here?" Mrs. James asked no one, opening up the package. It was too bad she had to die. Granted, she was 79. Death couldn't be too far off for her anyways.

She pulled out the robe from the box. Moment of truth. Bronson readied his gun. If she didn't do what was planned, he would have to kill her the old fashioned way. Fortunately, everything went accordingly. She walked into her bedroom and tried on the robe.

3... 2... 1... Mrs. James gasped. She clutched at her throat as she was lifted up in the air, sputtering and coughing for air. It didn't take very long for her to die. She was old, after all. She remained there hanging in the air limp and lifeless. Bronson pulled on the gloves and carefully removed the robe from her body, sending her falling to the ground.

Bronson walked around her house, trying to find what he had came for. His eyes caught a small jewelry box on the coffee table in her living room. It was locked, but that was no problem. Bronson pulled out Thurgood Marshall's gavel and gave the box a tap, crushing it instantly. He pulled out the small, pearl earring from the crushed remains of the box. "Cleopatra's earring." He purred. "Just what I was looking for." He placed it in a Zap Bag and made sure no one was around before exiting the house. While no one could see him, they would see the door open. He had gotten lucky last time that the man mowing his lawn had shrugged it off when he exited Albert Hicks's house. Otherwise there would've been two murders then.

And now it was time to deal with the people who were getting in his way.


End file.
